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Prodded by judge, defense lawyers in City Hall case wrap up their cross-examination of FBI agent

After nearly 30 hours — and a stern warning from the judge — defense lawyers in the Dallas City Hall corruption case have finished their cross-examination of an FBI agent who is a key government witness.

The agent, Allen Wilson, had been on the stand on and off since June 30. He was called by the prosecution in large part to guide jurors through the hours of phone conversations that the government secretly wiretapped in an effort to show that former Dallas City Council member Don Hill and others conspired to shake down housing developers for cash in exchange for Hill’s support of their projects.
With five defendants in the case — meaning five rounds of defense cross-examination — U.S. District Judge Barbara Lynn last week expressed exasperation at the pace. Wilson was only the prosecution’s fourth witness. With more than 100 people on the government’s list of potential witnesses, testimony is likely to stretch well into the fall.

After testimony concluded on Friday afternoon, the judge told lawyers it was, to her, “impossible to believe Mr. Wilson will be under further cross examination by noon Monday.”

“I mean it will be not be happening,” she bluntly stated.

Today, defense lawyer Victor Vital — representing Sheila Farrington Hill, Don Hill’s former mistress who is now his wife — seemed to be proceeding languorously with his questioning of Wilson.

The lawyer draped his arm casually across the lectern and sometimes strolled back and forth across the courtroom as he tried to show that the FBI’s investigation into Don Hill’s finances was selective and incomplete.

Just before 10 a.m., Lynn cut Vital’s questioning short and called the lawyers for both sides to the bench.

When Vital returned to the lectern, he had only a few more questions before passing the witness back to prosecutors.

The prosecution’s questioning of the agent proceeded at a noticeably faster clip. Government attorney Chad Meacham fired questions at Wilson one after another, often barely waiting for the agent’s one-word replies in between.

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